SMC honors graduates at winter ceremony

Posted on Friday, February 1st, 2013 at 4:08 pm.

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Graduation day.

It’s a landmark moment not only for those wearing the caps and gowns, but for the friends and family members who make up their support systems. A quick study of the beaming smiles and eyes filled with anticipation in the audience of the Temple Performing Arts Center before the Feb. 1 ceremony was proof enough.

“It’s a milestone for her and our family,” said Lisa Roberts-Amegatcher, whose daughter, Marchelle Roberts, is the first of her 10 siblings (most of whom were adopted) to graduate from college. “We’re very excited and we’re very proud. Words cannot express.”

Approximately 370 undergraduate and 18 graduate students graduated from the School of Media and Communication and the Division of Theater, Film and Media Arts in the Center for the Arts in August 2012 and January 2013. Their achievements were jointly celebrated during the SMC ceremony.

The graduates were sent off onto the next phase of their lives by journalism major Sarah Higgins. In her address, she recounted being a campus tour guide and all of the statistics she gave to prospective students — the average class size, the most popular majors. But she encouraged the graduates to transcend those numbers. “We’re not statistics. We’re success stories,” she said.

SMC also welcomed Mark Zumoff, RTF ’92, to graduation as its keynote speaker. The voice of the Philadelphia 76ers on Comcast SportsNet, Zumoff surprised the graduates with his piece of advice.

“Don’t look for a job,” he said. “I want you to go out and make friends. I want you to schmooze.”

Zumoff’s point? That building a network through volunteering, scheduling informational interviews and joining organizations is key to creating a successful future.

“I will leave here today to go live my dream,” he said. “After you leave today, go figure out how to live yours.”

Irene Convery, who was at the ceremony to watch her son, Patrick, graduate from the Media Studies and Production Department, is certain he’ll capture his dream.

Event Details

An Ideal Worth Defending? Professionalism Amidst Challenges to Autonomy and Boundaries in Journalism
Silvio Waisbord, George Washington University
Friday, April 3, 2:30-4:00
Annenberg Hall Atrium
Current anxiety about the future of news makes it [...]

Event Details

An Ideal Worth Defending? Professionalism Amidst Challenges to Autonomy and Boundaries in Journalism

Silvio Waisbord, George Washington University

Friday, April 3, 2:30-4:00

Annenberg Hall Atrium

Current anxiety about the future of news makes it opportune to revisit the notion of professionalism in journalism. Silvio Waisbord takes this pressing issue as his theme and argues that “professional journalism” is both a normative and analytical notion. It refers to reporting that observes certain ethical standards as well as to collective efforts by journalists to exercise control over the news. Professionalism should not be narrowly associated with the normative ideal as it historically developed in the West during the past century. Instead, it needs to be approached as a valuable concept to throw into sharp relief how journalists define conditions and rules of work within certain settings. Professionalization is about the specialization of labor and control of occupational practice. These issues are important, particularly amidst the combination of political, technological and economic trends that have profoundly unsettled the foundations of modern journalism. By doing so, they have stimulated the reinvention of professionalism. This engaging and insightful book critically examines the meanings, expectations, and critiques of professional journalism in a global context.

Silvio Waisbord is Professor and Director of Graduate Studies in the School of Media and Public Affairs at George Washington University. He is editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Press/Politics. His most recent books are Reinventing Professionalism: News and Journalism in Global Perspective (Polity), Vox Populista (Gedisa), and the edited volume Media Sociology: A Reappraisal (Polity). He is also the author of Watchdog Journalism in South America (Columbia University Press, 2000), and El Gran Desfile (The Great Parade, Sudamericana, 1995), and co-editor of Global Health Communication (Wiley, forthcoming 2012), Media and Globalization: Why the State Matters (Rowman and Littlefield, 2001) and Latin Politics, Global Media (University of Texas Press, 2002). He also wrote the novel Duelo (Biblos Argentina 2009). His areas of interest are journalism and politics, and media and communication in aid, development and social change. He holds a Ph.D. in Sociology (University of California, San Diego) and a Licenciatura in Sociology (Universidad de Buenos Aires).

Event Details

The Kal & Lucille Rudman Family Foundation supports the next generation of multi-media professionals by investing in academic centers of experiential learning at Temple University (The Kal & Lucille Rudman [...]

Event Details

The Kal & Lucille Rudman Family Foundation supports the next generation of multi-media professionals by investing in academic centers of experiential learning at Temple University (The Kal & Lucille Rudman Media Production Center), Drexel University (The Kal & Lucille Rudman Institute for Entertainment Industry Studies) and the Community College of Philadelphia (The Kal & Lucille Rudman Multi-media Project). This yearly examination of the most important issues confronting media professionals, students and scholars, is made possible through the generous support of the Rudman Foundation. The three producing entities want to thank the Rudmans.

This is the fourth Rudman Media Seminar. Previous editions have explored the role of media in the electoral process, the significance of social media in the so-called Arab Spring (as it was happening), and last year we hosted a master class in television reporting by NBC’s Bob Dotson.

Time

Location

9apr2:15 pm- 3:30 pmResearching the Recent Past: The Enduring Significance of 1995W. Joseph Campbell, American University

Event Details

Researching the Recent Past:The Enduring Significance of 1995
W. Joseph Campbell, American University
Thursday, April 9, 2:15-3:30
Annenberg Hall 3
W. Joseph Campbell will discuss his research into the recent past — specifically the watershed [...]

Event Details

Researching the Recent Past:The Enduring Significance of 1995

W. Joseph Campbell, American University

Thursday, April 9, 2:15-3:30

Annenberg Hall 3

W. Joseph Campbell will discuss his research into the recent past — specifically the watershed year of 1995 and its enduring significance. It was the year that marked the emergence of the Internet and World Wide Web into mainstream consciousness. It was the year of the Oklahoma City bombing, an attack that killed 168 people and signaled a deepening national preoccupation with terrorism. It was the year of the double-murder trial of O.J. Simpson, a prolonged yet fascinating ordeal often called the “Trial of the Century.” It was the year when a U.S.-brokered peace agreement ended the war in Bosnia, Europe’s most vicious conflict since the time of the Nazis. And it was the year when President Bill Clinton began an intermittent sexual dalliance with Monica Lewinsky, a White House intern 27 years his junior; the affair led to Clinton’s impeachment in 1998. Campbell also will address the challenges and rewards of conducting scholarly research into recent history.

W. Joseph Campbell is the author of six books, including most recently 1995: The Year the Future Began (University of California Press, 2015). He also wrote the media myth-busting book, Getting It Wrong: Ten of the Greatest Misreported Stories in American Journalism (University of California Press, 2010). Getting It Wrong won the national Sigma Delta Chi award in 2010 for research about journalism. Before entering the academy, Campbell was a newspaper and wire service reporter for 20 years, in a career that took him across North America to Europe, West Africa, and parts of Asia. He earned his PhD at the University of North Carolina in 1997 and soon afterward joined the faculty at American University, where he is now a full professor.